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Richard Burton Biography

original name Richard Walter Jenkins, Jr.

(1925 - 1984)

Related Works

Films
1949 The Last Days of Dolwyn
1952 My Cousin Rachel

1953 The Desert Rats
1953 The Robe
1955 The Prince of Players
1955 The Rains of Ranchipur
1956 Alexander the Great
1957 Sea Wife
1957 Bitter Victory
1959 Look Back in Anger
1960 The Bramble Bush
1960 Ice Palace
1962 Cleopatra
1963 The VIP's
1964 Becket
1964 Night of the Iguana
1965 The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
1965 The Sandpiper
1966 Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
1967 The Taming of the Shrew
1967 The Comedians
1967 Dr Faustus
1968 Boom!
1968 Candy
1969 Where Eagles Dare
1969 Staircase
1969 Anne of the Thousand Days
1971 Villain
1971 Raid on Rommel
1971 Under Milk Wood
1972 Hammersmith is Out
1972 The Assassination of Trotsky
1972 Bluebeard
1973 Massacre in Rome
1977 Exorcist II: The Heretic
1977 Equus
1978 The Wild Geese
1978 The Medusa Touch
1978 Absolution
1984 Nineteen Eighty Four

» More

Related People

Elizabeth Coles Taylor

Related Sites

Richard Burton fan page

(born Nov. 10, 1925, Pontrhydyfen, Wales—died Aug. 5, 1984, Geneva, Switz.) British stage and motion-picture actor noted for his portrayals of highly intelligent and articulate men who are world-weary, cynical, or self-destructive.

He was the 12th of 13 children born to a Welsh coal miner. He studied acting under Philip Burton, a schoolteacher who became his mentor and helped him obtain a scholarship to the University of Oxford. In gratitude to his benefactor, he assumed the professional name Burton. His first stage appearance was in 1943, but subsequent service as a Royal Air Force navigator delayed his career. In 1948 he resumed his stage performances and had his first role in a motion picture, The Last Days of Dolwyn. He scored his first real stage triumph in 1949 in Christopher Fry's The Lady's Not for Burning.Burton's first Hollywood film role was in My Cousin Rachel (1952). Throughout the remainder of the 1950s he specialized in historical roles in motion pictures, including the leading role in the first wide-screen CinemaScope production, The Robe (1953). Burton rose to superstar status during the filming of Cleopatra (1963), when he and his American co-star Elizabeth Taylor became lovers. Both of his highly publicized marriages to Taylor (1964–74, 1975–76) ended in divorce. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966) and The Taming of the Shrew (1967) are the best of the 11 films the couple made together. Burton's other important films include Becket and The Night of the Iguana (both 1964), The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1965), The Comedians (1967), and Equus (1977).Burton meanwhile continued to receive critical acclaim for his theatre performances. He acted in Shakespearean productions at London's Old Vic in 1953–56, and he gave a memorable performance of Hamlet in John Gielgud's long-running Broadway production of that play in 1964. Burton also played on Broadway in Jean Anouilh's Time Remembered (1957) and portrayed King Arthur in the Broadway musical Camelot in 1960 and 1980.